Oh I know that, you aren't talking to an amateur here or anything. Maybe I should clarify...

I am well beyond just trying to play the game right after 10 years of it. I am looking more for record setting. My setup will indeed have CB sources, but I am talking about doing enough damage to wear down their last 30~% of life as fast as possible once the CB no longer has any effect.

I know what you are thinking, but this is what I mean by speed. The idea here is that I will simply cast Life Tap from a charged wand on my targets (possibly all three at once. Very doable to take the three) and then rush in swinging in an effort to either kill them all in the ~25 seconds Tap is activated, or at least long enough to take out Mephisto so it isn't so risky to switch back real quick and cast it aain. But basically I am racing Life Tap without using Drac's or Exile.

The reason is that with Fort as my armor, I will need all the resist I can get, so HoZ is almost a must. But it also gives the most damage anyways, so it works.

Without needing to lean on Drac's, I am free to add an additional 350% damage to demons as well as get some much needed IAS since Runemaster has none and my only other source is Highlord's and Fanaticism.

Also, the reason I opt for Offensive GCs is because... well, unless you Smite, they are objectively better damage-wise. With only +6% increase per Zeal level, it makes more sense to increase Fanaticism, which grants an additional 17% per level instead.

Between Gores and Guillaume's, I will have 50% CB which is more than enough to handle that function.

But I just want to max out damage so that the Ubers' life falls at ALMOST a similar rate when CB was working. I know its not technically possible, I just want to get as close to it as I can.

What you're forgetting is that the damage of rune master is fairly low to begin with, and thus it would be far better to use a Grief PB. With perfect roll, a rune master only has ~190 average damage. Even an antiperfect Grief PB will have almost double that.

So with your setup, swithcing out the weapon only, you'll double your physical damage, not just against demons, but any monster. And that's not taking into account the swing speed...

Have you done some math, regarding if you swap an offensive skiller with max dmg charms? Thats always better when it comes to physical dmg.

If one skiller adds 17%ed, then removing them will lower your ed% to 1918% vs demons. But (if you use 10max gcs) with charms you get an additional 90max dmg. Directly added to your weapons base dmg.
With grief, youll do an insane amount of dmg.

However, you omitted at least +145% Damage from the minimum Required Strength 145 for an Ettin Axe, so that creeps up to at least 78% ED. More to the point, even a perfect ethereal Rune Master with 270% ED and socketed with a Zod Rune and four Ohm Runes or Ruby Jewels of Carnage (coincidentally, either would average 421.5 weapon damage) would not apply more weapon damage than a Grief Phase Blade with Damage +389 or more, even before considering Grief's other modifiers (30-40 IAS, 20% Deadly Strike, +% Damage to Demons (Based on Character Level), -25% Target Defence, ...)... and Grief's Damage +(340-400) applies to Smite as well.

Although Smite cannot be blocked (uber Mephisto and Diablo have 50% chance, Baal has 55%) and always hits (Zeal has maximum 95% chance to hit but all uber bosses are level 110 and Baal casts level 37 Chilling Armour for +225% Defence), it also doesn't apply minimum and maximum damage bonuses, +% Damage to Demons or Deadly Strike, and its maximum attack speed is 6 frames per attack versus an average of 4.8 for Zeal, so it might be possible for Zeal to achieve comparable or greater attack DPS (although you'd have to do some calculations to confirm or refute it).

However, in terms of applying Crushing Blow, Smite can attack every 6 frames while 50% chance to block effectively doubles Zeal to an average of 9.6 frames per attack before chance to hit is even considered (~10.1 frames with 95% chance to hit); Baal's 55% chance to block effectively increases Zeal to an average of ~10.67 frames per attack before chance to hit is considered (~11.23 frames with 95% chance to hit).

Huh. I am a tad confused though. I understand Runemaster is fairly low anyways, with a perfect one being only 270%. But how can adding, say, 5x Ohm's not make it comparable to say, a Breath of the Dying Ettin Axe? (Not that'd you'd use Ettin, just work with me here.)

I mean, that results in 520% ED. Certainly that trumps a BOTD in the same base, would it not?

And it that is the case, how exactly does Grief beat it out? I always though that the + integer damage didn't get the increase from skill-based ED. If I am mistaken and it does indeed get that, wouldn't that make Grief THE best melee weapon for any character class with an ED-based skill by MILES?

Still having a hard time wrapping my head around 520% resulting in a low damage weapon. If 520% is so lame, why would anyone EVER use a BOTD? Granted, I know that on ladder, BOTDs are indeed overshadowed by Griefs and Deaths often, but if 400% IS something to scoff at, are all the people who want one just misguided?

Something else I wonder about in lieu of this new information: If losing 350% damage to demons has such a negligible result against demons (i.e. in your table, it is literally a difference of ~13 damage when facing demons) then why is Fortitude so sought after for characters? I have always known for to have a SIGNIFICANT effect on my damage as a whole, and I understand that demon damage isn't listed. But if 350% damage to demons is essentially the same as 350% damage, then wouldn't that make Fort's increase EVEN LESS effective?

But like I said, this doesn't seem to be the case. So many melee characters use Fort for the huge damage increase. What part of the formula causes damage to demons to not be as effective? If damage to demons works the way it seems like it should, how is Laying of Hands not like a Fort on your wrists?

Huh. I am a tad confused though. I understand Runemaster is fairly low anyways, with a perfect one being only 270%. But how can adding, say, 5x Ohm's not make it comparable to say, a Breath of the Dying Ettin Axe? (Not that'd you'd use Ettin, just work with me here.)

I mean, that results in 520% ED. Certainly that trumps a BOTD in the same base, would it not?

Click to expand...

Helvete's comparison was of a perfect Rune Master (270% ED with 5 sockets) socketed with 5 Pul Runes as proposed by you, which applies 122-244 (183 average) weapon damage to which +375% Damage to Demons will be applied in sum with +% Damage and other +% Damage to Demons; a perfect Rune Master socketed with 5 Ohm Runes (520% ED) applies 204-409 (306.5 average) weapon damage.

A perfect ethereal Rune Master with 520% ED would apply 303-613 (458 average) weapon damage, but since it's not Indestructible it's a temporary weapon unless you use it with Blade Sentinel or Blade Fury (since using these skills doesn't cause durability loss). If you replace an Ohm Rune with a Zod Rune, then a perfect ethereal Rune Master with 470% ED applies 279-564 (421.5 average) weapon damage but it has no modifiers affecting attack speed or chance to hit, so even when it does more damage per hit, the lower frequency and higher failure rate of those hits may result in less damage over time and thus slower killing speed.

And it that is the case, how exactly does Grief beat it out? I always though that the + integer damage didn't get the increase from skill-based ED. If I am mistaken and it does indeed get that, wouldn't that make Grief THE best melee weapon for any character class with an ED-based skill by MILES?

Click to expand...

The character screen simply adds Grief's Damage +(340-400) to final attack damage, but it's actually added before +% Damage and Deadly Strike, similar to minimum and maximum damage bonuses. Consequently, even the worst roll on a Grief Phase Blade will result in 371-375 (average 373) weapon damage (perfect roll results in 431-435, averaging 433), in a weapon with the fastest weapon speed (-30) with (30-40) IAS (among other things, like +170% Damage to Demons (Based on Character Level) at level 91).

Something else the character screen doesn't display at all is that Grief's Damage +(340-400) is added to shield damage when using Smite, again before +% Damage is applied.

However, Grief's Damage +(340-400) does not apply to Dragon Talon, Tail or Flight, or Blade Sentinel or Fury, and it isn't used when calculating Vengeance added elemental damage (although it still gets applied when calculating its final physical damage).

Something else I wonder about in lieu of this new information: If losing 350% damage to demons has such a negligible result against demons (i.e. in your table, it is literally a difference of ~13 damage when facing demons) then why is Fortitude so sought after for characters?

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Five Pul Runes (+375% Damage to Demons) were replaced by Jewels or Ohm Runes totaling 75% Enhanced Damage. Even when it's on a weapon, +% Damage to Demons is added to off-weapon +% Damage, not weapon % Enhanced Damage. Increasing weapon % ED from 250% to 325% and applying +1,696% Damage and Damage to Demons results in more damage than 250% ED and +2,071% Damage and Damage to Demons (roughly, 4.25*17.96 = 76.33, while 3.5*21.71 = 75.985).

250% ED and +1,696% Damage and Damage to Demons results in ~2,065.4-4,148.76 damage while an additional +375% Damage to Demons results in ~2,496.65-5,015.1, a difference of ~431.25-866.34.

+% Damage to Demons is normally treated exactly the same as +% Damage when applied to a Demon, although it doesn't apply to some skills (Smite and Dragon Talon, Tail and Flight): for example, a Fortitude armour's +300% Damage adds 1,200 to 400 weapon damage, while Laying of Hands' +350% Damage to Demons adds 1,400 to it when applied to a Demon.

I mean, that results in 520% ED. Certainly that trumps a BOTD in the same base, would it not?

And it that is the case, how exactly does Grief beat it out? I always though that the + integer damage didn't get the increase from skill-based ED. If I am mistaken and it does indeed get that, wouldn't that make Grief THE best melee weapon for any character class with an ED-based skill by MILES?

Still having a hard time wrapping my head around 520% resulting in a low damage weapon. If 520% is so lame, why would anyone EVER use a BOTD? Granted, I know that on ladder, BOTDs are indeed overshadowed by Griefs and Deaths often, but if 400% IS something to scoff at, are all the people who want one just misguided?

Click to expand...

The ethereal bonus (50%ED) works on the base weapon damage, making any ethereal weapon 50% more net damage than any non eth counterpart. Goes like this (example):

Thanks for the replies everyone. I have learned quite a bit. As I am sure many of you can tell, despite playing this game on and off since 2003, I still hardly know the inner-workings and mechanics like you hardened veterans, so your patience and help is VERY much appreciated.

And Helvete, I have wanted to say this for yeaers, but that is the manliest profile picture. Ever. *golf clap*

Hehe, it's "the cigarette smoking man" from the x-files series. One of my fav bad guys of all time, always working in the shadows, always has a card to play, and never speaks unless he actually has something to say =)

After 10 years you didn't know to use max damage charms instead of Offensive aura GCs? BK on melee chars? I don't think you're past trying to play the game right. Nobody is going to set Uber Tristram killing records next to a smiter.

A bunch of junky, single mod charms with LR and life. He does Uber Tristram by himself and he does it really quickly, faster than people who put a ton of expensive gear on. You don't need Fortitude, you don't need Last Wish, you don't need Exile. You don't even need Grief and Herald and Highlord's. You can use a Black flail and a Spirit elite paladin shield.

it is not a hacked item. when there is too much text it will start to truncate, and the order that it removes things isn't intuitive. 5os runemaster with one of each element facet and a 1.08 multiple prefix/suffix jewel. the item name and damage were truncated.